Enron - Were they the Crookedest Guys in the Room?

The Rise of the Big "E"
In May 1985, InterNorth Incorporated and Houston Natural Gas announced that they would merge. Their combined value was an estimated $2.3 billion. These firms were two of the largest gas pipeline companies in the United States. As part of the negotiations, the chairman and CEO of InterNorth, Sam Segnar, would be the head of the new entity until January 1,
1987, when the chairman and CEO of Houston Natural Gas, Kenneth Lay, would take over.
The new company was initially called HNG/lnterNorth and later was renamed Enron.' Lay's first choice for the new name of the company was “Enteron,” but that was scrapped just days before it was announced to the public when Lay learned that enteron was the name for the digestive tract.
In 1990, Lay created a division of Enron called Enron Finance Corporation and hired Jeffrey
Skilling to run the company. Skilling had been an accounting consultant to Enron through the firm of McKinsey & Company. Lay was so impressed with the accounting systems that
Skilling developed for Enron that he custom-tailored the lead position at Enron Finance
Corporation for him.
By 1995, Enron had become the largest independent natural gas company in the United
States. In 1996, Andrew Fastow, Enron's chief financial officer and one of the key players in
Enron's downfall, was almost fired from Enron when he did an unsatisfactory job of managing a retail unit of Enron that competed against local utilities in different parts of the
United States. But Fastow used his connections within Enron to keep his job and return to the finance department.
In 1997, Skilling became president and chief operating officer of Enron. Fastow was in charge of the complex transfer of debt from Enron's balance sheet to two LJM partnerships, which
Skilling and Enron's board of